Magical History Tour - City Symphonies

Walter Ruttmann's BERLIN. DIE SINFONIE DER GROSSSTADT (D 1927) is not only a singular portrait of the dazzling metropolis in the mid-1920s but also the linchpin of an eponymous series of short and long documentaries from the 1920s and 30s. The city symphonies employed rhythmic montage and associative sequences of images to capture the increasing dynamism, mechanization and modernity of cities. Rhythm, tempo, movement, abstraction and the joy of experimenting shaped these filmic approaches to Berlin, Nice, Moscow, New York and Paris. Those we are showing in June are taken from across film history and include specimens which revere the first city symphonies as well as distant echoes of the early cinematic urban explorations.